SafetyBob
Enlightened
To help the wife buy into this flashlight stuff I decided I needed to do something drastic. Believe it or not, she was not that thrilled when I gave her a 3C M@glight with Malkoff drop-in, UCL and stippled reflector. I thought it was a great gift....just because. She (as some have already pointed out to me) thought it was just a tad bit big. Great spill and overall light for power outage though!!
OK, so I got some Duracoat which is normally a firearms paint. Google Duracoat and you can go to their website if you wish. The nice part about this stuff is all you need is an airbrush and I recommend strongly connecting the airbrush not to bottled air (cheap, crappy connector..been there done that about two hours ago) but instead use one of those cheap screw on air filter/dryers in plastic and then connect all of this to your airbrush and pancake compressor. Then you will have a nice outfit.
This stuff just needs to dry overnight. No oven, no electrostatic, nothing but time. You can stick it in a 100 degree oven to cut drying time down a whole bunch (3 hours I think) but let's make it simple. Spray then let it dry. Easy.
OK, here are the shots with links for full sized pictures. Yes there is color differences between actual and these pictures. This is supposed to be a lanvender color. And it really is in person. This is a 2C M@glight.
First, a view from the rear.....
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0555.jpg
OK, and now the front view.....
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0558.jpg
Here are two different pictures of the same thing. A close up of the actual head. You will note that although you can't see it, I taped just a little before the threads although the bezel was just unscrewed and provided clearance along with the main part of the head was also unscrewed so that the main body would get the color. The tail cap was actually taped some.
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0557.jpg
and one with flash on...
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0559.jpg
Sorry that last one is a little out of focus. New camera, operator error.
I gave the flashlight a good scuffing with a 3m grey scotchbrite pad and then followed up with 500 wet/dry paper to ensure a good tooth for the paint. The duracoat help line suggested that just the scotchbrite would be OK, but I really wanted to see some scratching inorder to ensure proper sticking of the paint. I cleaned/degreased with Duracoats recommended cleaner/degreaser. Air dried for a couple of minutes and gave it the color coat. Would have been alot easier had I NOT used the bottle air and used my pancake compressor from the start. With 10 to 15 minutes of very light spraying the color went on OK, but did not gloss...closer to satin.
Gave things a little power dry with heat gun held about 18 inches away and fanned slightly for about 7 to 10 minutes. The garage was probably about 55 to 60 degress and it is 1/2 mile to 3/4 mile visibility so it is humid too. Since this is the first time using this stuff, unlike the laquer I use for wood spray finishing, this stuff seemed like it didn't car if it was cold or humid. Can't wait to try it again in the heat to find out what it really does.
On to the gloss finish. You can order a satin, semi-gloss or gloss clear from the Duracoat people to. I mixed both gloss and color as follows: 4 tablespoons of color/gloss, and one teaspoon hardner. I didn't use all the color (ran out of bottled air) but used all the gloss. It took 2/3's of the gloss to finally get it to raise a gloss. I just kept rotating and rotating the stick with the flashlight on it. Finally it started to gloss up and level out. I was getting worried for a time. I probably could have left it at the first sign of gloss because when I did quit I noticed it was seeming to settle out and gloss very nicely. I hope you can see the gloss on the pictures. I will try to use my older and more familiar camera tomorrow after it dries and macro the flashlight.
Hope anyone thinking of this gets a good idea of whats involved. Not much really....just make sure you use or borrow a pancake type compressor to do this, it would make it much easier. Overall, this stuff was easy and straightforward to apply and I am NOT a professional painter, refinisher or anything else.
Bob E.
OK, so I got some Duracoat which is normally a firearms paint. Google Duracoat and you can go to their website if you wish. The nice part about this stuff is all you need is an airbrush and I recommend strongly connecting the airbrush not to bottled air (cheap, crappy connector..been there done that about two hours ago) but instead use one of those cheap screw on air filter/dryers in plastic and then connect all of this to your airbrush and pancake compressor. Then you will have a nice outfit.
This stuff just needs to dry overnight. No oven, no electrostatic, nothing but time. You can stick it in a 100 degree oven to cut drying time down a whole bunch (3 hours I think) but let's make it simple. Spray then let it dry. Easy.
OK, here are the shots with links for full sized pictures. Yes there is color differences between actual and these pictures. This is supposed to be a lanvender color. And it really is in person. This is a 2C M@glight.
First, a view from the rear.....
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0555.jpg
OK, and now the front view.....
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0558.jpg
Here are two different pictures of the same thing. A close up of the actual head. You will note that although you can't see it, I taped just a little before the threads although the bezel was just unscrewed and provided clearance along with the main part of the head was also unscrewed so that the main body would get the color. The tail cap was actually taped some.
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0557.jpg
and one with flash on...
http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd94/reverding58/100_0559.jpg
Sorry that last one is a little out of focus. New camera, operator error.
I gave the flashlight a good scuffing with a 3m grey scotchbrite pad and then followed up with 500 wet/dry paper to ensure a good tooth for the paint. The duracoat help line suggested that just the scotchbrite would be OK, but I really wanted to see some scratching inorder to ensure proper sticking of the paint. I cleaned/degreased with Duracoats recommended cleaner/degreaser. Air dried for a couple of minutes and gave it the color coat. Would have been alot easier had I NOT used the bottle air and used my pancake compressor from the start. With 10 to 15 minutes of very light spraying the color went on OK, but did not gloss...closer to satin.
Gave things a little power dry with heat gun held about 18 inches away and fanned slightly for about 7 to 10 minutes. The garage was probably about 55 to 60 degress and it is 1/2 mile to 3/4 mile visibility so it is humid too. Since this is the first time using this stuff, unlike the laquer I use for wood spray finishing, this stuff seemed like it didn't car if it was cold or humid. Can't wait to try it again in the heat to find out what it really does.
On to the gloss finish. You can order a satin, semi-gloss or gloss clear from the Duracoat people to. I mixed both gloss and color as follows: 4 tablespoons of color/gloss, and one teaspoon hardner. I didn't use all the color (ran out of bottled air) but used all the gloss. It took 2/3's of the gloss to finally get it to raise a gloss. I just kept rotating and rotating the stick with the flashlight on it. Finally it started to gloss up and level out. I was getting worried for a time. I probably could have left it at the first sign of gloss because when I did quit I noticed it was seeming to settle out and gloss very nicely. I hope you can see the gloss on the pictures. I will try to use my older and more familiar camera tomorrow after it dries and macro the flashlight.
Hope anyone thinking of this gets a good idea of whats involved. Not much really....just make sure you use or borrow a pancake type compressor to do this, it would make it much easier. Overall, this stuff was easy and straightforward to apply and I am NOT a professional painter, refinisher or anything else.
Bob E.
